Stockman, Miller bill restores veteran gun rights

Second Amendment rights of law-abiding military veterans continue to be stripped away without due process.

A 1998 agreement between the Department of Veterans Affairs and the FBI was one of the first jabs at veterans’ Second Amendment rights. The agreement was made to send the names of veterans into the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, triggering a virtual lifetime ban from owning firearms of those who are labeled as “mentally incompetent,” meaning they need or desire the assistance of a fiduciary to help them manage, often complicated, financial affairs.

This agreement forced law-abiding veterans into the NICS database without due process.

There are legislators attempting to end the practice of forwarding names of military veterans to be stripped of their Second Amendment rights.

This congressional session, congressmen Stephen E. Stockman (R.-Texas) and Jefferson B. “Jeff” Miller R.-Florida) introduced H.R. 602, the Veterans Second Amendment Protection Act, to combat the assault to our law-abiding soldiers. Miller is the chairman of the House Committee on Veteran Affairs.

This bill has yet to be voted on the floor, but at the same time, states across the country are incorporating this type of “mental health” legislation targeting the general population in an attempt to forward the names of law-abiding citizens’ into the NICS database without due process.

“NAGR encourages all gun rights supporters to contact their Senators and Congressmen and urge them to pass Veterans Second Amendment Protection legislation,” said Dudley Brown, executive vice president of the National Association for Gun Rights. “While you have them on the phone, tell them to quit voting to take away the gun rights of ordinary Americans the same way.”

Seldom do the media discuss the topic of veterans Second Amendment rights being stripped away without due process, and the way this practice will be reversed is by everyday Americans contacting their legislators to act.

The race to disarm veterans keeps escalating.

In 2007, Congress enacted a veterans disarmament act, the 2007 NICS Improvement Act. Most importantly, this act solidified the practice of forwarding names of veterans who had at any time been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, or exhibit any evidence that meets the broad criteria of a prohibited person, regardless of whether they represent a threat to themselves or others.

Those erroneously labeled as a prohibited person are entered into the NICS database, and are still not afforded due process in a court of law.

Since the 1998 agreement around 116,000 veterans were impacted through 2007. The most recent reports now list that number around 175,000.